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A.Word.A.Day--suppurate

This week's theme: what does that company name mean?

suppurate (SUHP-yuh-rayt) verb intr.

To produce or secrete pus.

[From Latin suppuratus, past participle of suppurare, from sub- + pur- (pus).]

See more usage examples of suppurate in Vocabulary.com's dictionary.

-Anu Garg (words at wordsmith.org)

"From one perspective, a certain irony attends the publication of any good new book on American usage. It is that the people who are going to be interested in such a book are also the people who are least going to need it. ... The sorts of people who feel that special blend of wincing despair and sneering superiority when they see EXPRESS LANE - 10 ITEMS OR LESS or hear dialogue used as a verb or realize that the founders of the Super 8 motel chain must surely have been ignorant of the meaning of suppurate." David Foster Wallace; Tense Present: Democracy, English, And the Wars Over Usage; Harper's Magazine (New York); Apr 2001.

"We do not expect the son of the England football team captain to follow him in the job or John Major's son to be Prime Minister. So why do we exalt the law of succession in the case of kings and queens? Because THEY want to keep it that way. They rather enjoy the ruling biz. It beats emptying bedpans in an NHS hospital. Simple Sophie has brought this suppurating carbuncle on the face of public life to the boil." Paul Routledge; Why We Must Axe the Royals; The Mirror (London); Apr 10, 2001.

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